CCC to Hold Workshop on Extreme Scale Design Automation
WASHINGTON, D.C., February 27, 2013
On March 7-8, 2013, the Computing Community Consortium (CCC) – an activity of the Computing Research Association (CRA) – will hold the first of a series of three workshops to discuss the future of research on electronic design automation, considering both the challenges of manufacturing and designing electronics with ever increasing complexity, and the difficulties faced by academics in preparing the next generation of design automation experts. For more information, visit the workshop webpage here.
Modern electronics manufacturing has reached the point where semiconductor technology can no longer scale in the old ways (Dennard scaling) to pack new transistors in silicon chips. Research in design methods and manufacturing techniques of future electronic systems indicates that, in under ten years, computational systems will be fundamentally different from what they are today. To this end, the semiconductor industry has been involved in protracted roadmapping efforts (e.g. ITRS), but these efforts focused on the feasibility of production technologies (silicon and alternatives) and seek to minimize risk rather than maximize rewards. Industry roadmaps are unclear on how to move forward, and on how good the final result may be. To address this research vacuum, a significant investment has been placed in the development of new “emerging” fabrication technologies to augment or replace silicon devices. A large number of promising candidate technologies are now available, but require extensive ecosystems of computer-aided design tools, similar to those painstakingly developed for conventional technologies over the last 50 years. Even with conventional semiconductor technologies, existing electronic design automation (EDA) tools cannot effectively harness the scale possible in today’s chips.
The goal of the workshop series is to develop a consensus around the following questions
- What are most critical directions for EDA research in support of extreme scale designs? (e.g. validation, power optimization and control, resilient and self-evolving systems design, technology- and application software-aware tools are clearly such challenges)
- What are potential new application domains for EDA? (computational biology, net-zero environmental impact systems, automotive?) Should EDA refocus on full systems?
- To what extent should EDA research agenda and funding be driven by the industry? (given that industry focuses on the near term and is highly cyclical)
- What are the best practices for collaboration between industry and academia? (considering the research and educational needs of the EDA community)
- What are the educational priorities for EDA? (from the workforce perspective and also with cutting-edge research in mind)
The first workshop will focus on two topics. The first focus is on preparing the next generation of design automation professionals; the best and brightest students are frequently drawn off into other “hot” areas, leaving a vacuum of talent to address the challenges of the next generation of both silicon circuitry as well as emerging technologies. The second focus is on ways that emerging technologies can be effectively evaluated, to know if they are truly promising and worth heavy investment, or if they are simply intellectual curiosities.
A second workshop, to be co-located with the Design Automation Conference in Austin, Texas, will focus more tightly on the needs of the electronics industry. The third workshop, to be co-located with the International Conference on Computer-Aided Design in San Jose, CA, will unify prior efforts, producing a set of benchmarks, metrics, and milestones, to plan efforts and track progress in reinvigorating the design automation field.
Following the distribution of initial findings, the workshop organizers will summarize workshop findings and allow remarks by representatives of other interested parties. The workshop series is being organized by researchers active in the ACM special interest group on design automation (ACM/SIGDA). A draft workshop summary will be posted to the CRA/ CCC website for open community comment. A final report, informed by all the workshop activities, will identify promising research and development areas and trajectories for design automation.
For more information, visit the workshop webpage here.
About the CCC: The Computing Community Consortium (CCC; http://cra.org/ccc) was established in fall 2006 under a Cooperative Agreement between the Computing Research Association (CRA) and the National Science Foundation (NSF). A standing committee of CRA, the CCC seeks to mobilize the computing research community to debate long-range challenges and build consensus around specific research visions. The CCC specifically pursues the next big computing ideas that will define the future of the field, attract the very best talent, and catalyze research investment and public support in the long term.
About the CRA: The Computing Research Association (CRA; http://cra.org/) was established 40 years ago and has members at more than 220 North American academic, industrial, and government research entities. Its mission is to strengthen research and advance education in computing fields, expand opportunities for women and minorities, and improve public and policymaker understanding of the importance of computing and computing research in society.
For more information: Contact Kenneth Hines, Program Associate at the Computing Community Consortium: khines@cra.org; 202-266-2936.
